By Odeisel

While Jay Electronica took the first train to Jiggaville, Stalley remains down with Dame and continues to drop dope shit that doesn’t pander to your pop sensibilities. Ohio’s bearded wonder comes with another heater with his latest video “Hercules.”

The track takes liberties with the legendary Aaron Neville’s song of the same name, originally used by the 2 Live Crew for “In The Dust” from the New Jack City soundtrack. That bassline is the head shaking, face frown-forcing main attraction, but the flipping of Neville’s verse and the atmospherics add quiet character to the track, particularly the strings on the break.

Stalley is growing stronger in presence and this song is a perfect example of his crisp diction and pronunciation. Stalley uses them as weapons to sharpen his raspy, smoky voice, giving him a distinctive sound. Lyrically he’s able to draw strong allegory with his lines (On point like a scoreboard) drawing clear separation between himself and rap industry lames. He doesn’t lay back and let the beat do the lifting, nor does he try to go wild and bully it. He strikes the proper balance that so many young rappers find hard to grasp.

Hopefully we can hear a larger body of work for Stalley soon. This is the good part, before the vultures start circling and prior to the bidding wars and after the rhyming over beats from Mookie and them. The part where we become fans. We’ll sit by the radio, hands on the dial and make like Sherman Klump’s momma yelling “Hercalees Hercalees Hercalees!” Stalley comes strong. Enjoy.

[pro-player width=’425′ height=’344′ type=’video’]http://vimeo.com/17652801[/pro-player]

Here’s the Aaron Neville original just to get you hip

[pro-player width=’425′ height=’344′ type=’video’]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3mz52S5ulk[/pro-player] 

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